"America has two great dominant strands of political thought - conservatism,
which, at its very best, draws lines that should not be crossed;
and progressivism, which, at its very best, breaks down barriers that
should never have been erected."
-- Bill Clinton, Dedication of the Clinton Presidential Library, November 2004

Tuesday, April 15, 2003

This article is actually entitled Hart: No Decision Yet on White House Run, but it features this segment on Gov. Dean's statement that the case has not been made to take military action in Syria. From the reports that I have seen, very few people actually believe that the Bush administration would actually engage in armed conflict there. They have, however, been applying pressure on Syria and pushing the country with influence gained from the action in Iraq. Dean's comments may be more of a response towards fellow Democratic presidential candidate FL Sen. Bob Graham who suggested that the U.S. "throw a few cruise missiles" into Syria.

Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean said that although Syria has sponsored terrorism in the Middle East, the president hasn't begun to make the case for invasion.

Bush administration officials have accused Syria of sheltering Iraqi fugitives, possessing chemical weapons and supporting terrorism, but have emphasized there are no plans to go to war with Syria.

One of Dean's rivals for the Democratic nomination, Florida Sen. Bob Graham, has suggested the United States may have to "throw a few cruise missiles" into Syria. Another candidate, Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman, has called for "very aggressive diplomacy" with Syria.

"The president attacked Iraq, in my view, without making the case that Iraq is a danger," Dean said after an appearance in Washington Tuesday night. "He certainly hasn't begun to make that case about Syria either. I think the notion that we just now are going to become a new empire is something that we ought to be thinking carefully about because it's way outside what mainstream American values are."

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About Nation-Building

Nation-Building was founded by Aziz Poonawalla in August 2002 under the name Dean Nation. Dean Nation was the very
first weblog devoted to a presidential candidate, Howard Dean, and became the vanguard of the Dean netroot phenomenon, raising
over $40,000 for the Dean campaign, pioneering the use of Meetup, and enjoying the attention of the campaign itself, with Joe Trippi
a regular reader (and sometime commentor). Howard Dean himself even left a comment once. Dean Nation was a group weblog effort and counts
among its alumni many of the progressive blogsphere's leading talent including Jerome Armstrong, Matthew Yglesias, and Ezra Klein. After
the election in 2004, the blog refocused onto the theme of "purple politics",
formally changing its name to Nation-Building in June 2006.
The primary focus of the blog is on articulating
purple-state policy at home and
pragmatic liberal interventionism abroad.